


Mania

by CrackingLamb



Category: Borderlands (Video Games)
Genre: Established Relationship, F/M, Krieg typical violence, Nurse Maya, Post-psychosis comfort
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-29
Updated: 2018-05-29
Packaged: 2019-05-15 12:08:10
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,240
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14790249
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/CrackingLamb/pseuds/CrackingLamb
Summary: Maya sees Release the Beast for the first time, but now her psycho killer boyfriend needs some help coming down from the high.





	Mania

The missile launcher attack came from nowhere it seemed, throwing Maya off her feet into the rocky scrabble on the road outside the Bloodshot Dam as her shield absorbed the majority of the blast. It helped that the missile hadn't exactly been intended for her, which meant...

“I TOLD YOU WHAT WOULD HAPPEN!”

Krieg's voice – normally a cackling, almost joyful scream – was pitched too low, too ominous. He was shifting and changing right before her eyes, writhing with pain or maybe exaltation. She'd never seen this change before. It was...visceral.  From normal, run of the mill psycho to _holy shit, he's a badass psycho_!

He was shouting now, totally incomprehensible. One arm bulged and literally grew in size, the slag injection cords running from wrist to shoulder stretching against his skin. It made his other arm look puny in comparison. His buzzaxe shone for a moment, clean and bright, before he leapt onto the marauders that had ambushed them, the foolish, idiot bruiser with the missile launcher first on his agenda. Maya watched from the ground where she'd landed as Krieg cut a swathe through the hapless bandits in moments, screaming the whole time. He was covered in blood and gore and was still racing around, slashing at nothing.

“RAGE!”

He stood alone now, visibly shaking and muttering to himself as he shrank from huge psychotic killer to...normal psychotic killer. In the months they'd spent traveling together, she had never seen him rage quite that hard. She had to admit, while terrifying, it was also effective. _Release the beast_ , she thought. In his saner moments he'd told her it might happen if he took enough damage. It made her feel something. Something strange and almost frightening. Something above and beyond her normal affection for the big lug, with his brain snapped in two and his body an outward expression of that split, hard but broken.

“Whoa,” she said, and his head whipped around to face her as if he'd forgotten she was even there. Which was entirely likely.

“What a fantastic blood boy I've become!” he said gleefully, although for one single moment the look in his visible eye was stunningly sane.

“You all right?” she asked, getting to her feet and dusting off her backside. She would probably have a bruise there tomorrow, but she couldn't let him know. He was oddly protective of her, well, of all of them really, and wouldn't like knowing she had any pain anywhere, especially if he was the cause. He was casual about inflicting it upon himself, and equally as casual about friendly fire, but he didn't harm his friends. Not that getting thrown off her feet by a missile was his fault, unless one considered that he was a giant of a man and made a fairly easy target in the open. He couldn't help that, and she didn't hold it against him.

“GET OUT GET OUT GET OUT!” he suddenly shouted, slamming the blunt end of the buzzaxe against his head. Maya knew better than to rush to him and try to pull it away. He wasn't all there just yet and might accidentally lash out at her; it had happened before. Once. He was fighting with his inner voice again. The one that tried to break through at times and make him...normal.

“Krieg,” she tried again from the distance between them.

“Blue tattoos,” he murmured, lowering the buzzaxe until it brushed the ground. He fell to his knees, his eye wild and wide within his mask. He heaved for air like he'd been running, a common ailment for him. Between the constant inner battle for his mind and the slag running through his veins, it was no surprise. “Forever and ever.”

She knew it was safe to approach him now, and rested her hands lightly on his shoulders, still twitching under the skin. She had never even drawn a weapon in the fight, never had to phaselock a single enemy. His awful rage had done all the work, but now he needed help coming down from it. She cupped his face in her hands and he tried to pull away when he saw her clean fingers against his bloody skin, but she didn't let him.

“Stay with me, Big Guy.”

“Angry...I'm angry...” But his hands gripped her hips, holding her close enough that he could rest his head against her belly. He shuddered all over like he had a fever. Or like he was afraid.

“I know. C'mon, stay with me. Look at me.”

“Maya...” His head lifted from her body and tipped back to look at her. Sanity had won...for the moment. She smiled, a gentle soft smile that he loved like praise and she knew it. What a pair they were, a disillusioned siren and an escaped psycho. Or maybe released. Unleashed? He never talked about that time, unless one counted the screeching when he raged. Damn Hyperion.

“Good job, Krieg,” she said, stroking her fingers across whatever she could touch of his face. Sometimes he flinched, but not today. “Let's go, baby.”

“The sweet siren call of home,” he said, almost too low for her to hear. “I'm nothing but blood.”

“It will wash off.”

“Not from my soul.”

She tugged on his arm, pulling him to his feet. He towered over her, nearly seven feet of twitching, writhing muscle and pain and anger. She took the buzzaxe from his limp hand and slid it into its sheath across his back, lacing their hands together as she did. Sometimes touch was all he needed to return from that dark place where his inner voice shouted so futilely. Sometimes she could even hear it through his screams. Today was a good day, and the voices were silent.

He lifted a huge bloody hand and touched her cheek, right where her siren markings underscored her eye. “Pretty. Take me home.”

“Home? Or do you want to finish them off?”

“RRRGHH.” He struggled for a moment, then shook his head. “Home, the peaceful place with the softest bouncing.”

Well, that was encouraging. She didn't see any more bandits or marauders anyway. The Dam had been pretty quiet since they had cleared the place out. Felt like forever ago, but she knew it was less than half a planetary cycle. Now even Jack was dead.

“Did you even loot the bodies?” she teased, sure now that he was in a mental place where she could do that without much danger of setting him off again.

“Killing tools!” he cried, happy like a kid on Mercenary Day.

“Anything good?”

“Pfft, nah.” And just like that, he was back from the manic spiral. Her Krieg, the one who could quote Shakespeare and echovids. She chuckled and swung their arms just like she would a child's and they started walking away from the pile of late, unlamented marauders and the bruiser now scattered in gory pieces before the rakk and the skags arrived.

“I know you warned me about that, but I gotta say... That was a tiny bit hot.” Up ahead was the Happy Pig Motel, and their way home to Sanctuary, still floating serenely over the Highlands. At least the view was nice.

“Crazy siren,” he muttered, but she could hear the smile in his voice.

His grip tightened on hers, not painful, just mindful. It was enough to keep him with her.

“NIPPLE SALADS!”

Maybe...

**Author's Note:**

> This is my very first Borderlands fic. I love this murder couple, and at some point I do plan to write more of their adventures on Pandora.


End file.
